TV ratings: Halle Berry's 'Extant' gets big audience that skews older

Halle Berry's 'Extant' opens with a big audience but can't match last year's 'Under the Dome'

Halle Berry's new sci-fi series launched with a big audience Wednesday night for CBS but didn't blast off quite like "Under the Dome" did last year.

"Extant" is CBS' attempt to create another summer hit with the help of executive producer Steven Spielberg, who also serves as EP on "Under the Dome." In "Extant," Berry plays an astronaut who returns to Earth and discovers she is mysteriously pregnant.

According to preliminary numbers from Nielsen, the premiere averaged 9.42 million viewers, making it the most-watched broadcast television show of the night. It earned a rating of 1.7 among the key demographic of 18- to 49-year-old viewers, which is not astronomical but still makes it the highest-rated summer premiere for a new series.

For comparison, "Under the Dome" opened last summer with well more than 13 million viewers and a 3.3 in the 18-49 demo, though it has dropped off this season, most recently notching a 1.7.

Older viewers turned out for "Extant," evidenced by the big 2.4 rating it got in the 25-54 age demographic.

In 18-49, the night's top show was CBS' lead-in to "Extant," the reality TV stalwart "Big Brother" (1.9).

Elsewhere in broadcast TV, Fox's "So You Think You Can Dance" pulled a 1.2 in 18-49, down 8% from a week ago. ABC ran virtually all reruns, except for the low-rated "Motive" (0.8), while NBC's "Taxi: Brooklyn" was flat with last week's 1.0.

CW again carried the iHeart Radio Ultimate Pool Party, which didn't do wonders for the network but did better than last year, rising a tenth of a point to a 0.3 in 18-49. It averaged 824,000 viewers overall.

Follow Ryan Faughnder on Twitter for more entertainment business news: @rfaughnder